PM Imran Khan’s softness for his MPs jeopardising good governance

ISLAMABAD: To the surprise of many, Prime Minister Imran Khan, who is, otherwise, known for his vision on issues concerning governance, is keeping a mum on all incidents of bad-governance, during the first few weeks of his tenure, involving his party’s MPs and those holding important public offices.

Not even in a single case, he or his government, opted to proceed against the political figures accused of doing the wrong. Instead in certain cases, the PM was found acting to the benefit of those whose very act was the reason for bad governance.

In Pakpattan DPO transfer case, the matter was apparently left by the government for the Supreme Court of Pakistan to decide. However, the then Inspector General Punjab Kaleem Imam, who had acted as a “rubber stamp”, while unfairly removing the DPO Pakpattan following political pressure, was appointed IGP Sindh.

On the other hand, while the matter was sub judice before the apex court, the former DPO Pakpattan Rizwan Gondal, who had resisted the political pressure, was surrendered to the federal government by Punjab.

Surprisingly, Prime Minster Imran Khan approved Kaleem Imam’s appointment as IGP Sindh after the officer was severely reprimanded by the Chief Justice of Pakistan for submitting a compromised inquiry report on the incident.

The CJP was really disappointed from Kaleem Imam over the compromised inquiry report that Imam had prepared following apex court’s direction. The CJP rejected Imam’s report and assigned reputed National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta) Coordinator Khaliq Dad Lak to probe the matter.

Lak’s report, submitted before the SC on Wednesday, concluded that it was Chief Minister Usman Buzdar’s office which was calling the shots and not Kaleem Imam, who according to the report, had acted as a “rubber stamp” to remove ex-DPO Pakpattan.

In two other similar incidents of political pressure in which Deputy Commissioner of Chakwal and DC Rajanpur had complained of having been pressured by PTI MNAs Sardar Zulfikar Ali Khan and Sardar Nasrullah Khan Dreshak, respectively, the prime minister spoke against the DCs for not following chain of command while lodging their complaints. He, however, did not initiate any action against his MNAs for pressuring the DCs to get their favourite revenue officials (Patwaris) transferred to their choice circles.

While those who brought political pressure on DCs remained untouched, inquiries were ordered against the DCs. Imran Khan and his government are also tight lipped over The News’ recent report about several federal ministers and ministers of state, who, in violation of the law, have employed extra staff with them.

It was reported that while Prime Minister Imran Khan had drastically cut the staff associated with his office to become an example for others to promote austerity and save taxpayers’ money but several of his cabinet ministers were having bloated staff beyond the sanctioned strength determined by law.

The relevant law—Federal Ministers and Ministers of State (Salaries, Allowances and Privileges ) Act, 1975 (as amended on 01.10.2016)--was also referred to in the story which allows only five member staff. However, in many cases, the cabinet members violate this law by adding more members to their staff.

The law, though entitles a cabinet member to have one private secretary, one personal assistant, one Urdu stenographer or stenotypist, one Qasid and one Naib Qasid, The News reported how several ministers were having additional staff members like director to minister, protocol officer, personal staff officer, public relation officer.

Most, if not all the ministers, named in the story, are still enjoying the bloated staff at the cost of public money.

On Thursday, the media also reported the alleged involvement of Punjab Minister Mehmoodur Rashid’s son in kidnapping of Lahore policemen. The minister, however, denied that his son was involved in any such activity.

Prime minister’s adviser on media Iftikhar Durrani, when contacted, said that it would be unfair to judge the governance of the PTI government which has yet to complete its 50 days in power. He said that even one year is not enough to evaluate governance of any government.

Durrani explained that the first year will be the year of reforms, second year will be the time to test the new systems, whereas the third year will be year of evaluation of governance.

When asked why does the PM ignores the wrongs of his MPs and others holding important public positions, he said that in a highly politicised environment one could not expect from the politicians to behave perfectly within no time. Give them sometime to respond to the new realities, he said.

Durrani assured that Prime Minister Imran Khan will never compromise on his integrity and is determined to get the things right. He added that despite a few incidents of political interference, generally the PTI MPs and their ministers in Punjab have stopped interfering into bureaucratic affairs.